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Greenland losing grip on $5B Pacific Park megaproject

Nick Mastroianni’s USIF moves to foreclose on second phase of 22-acre project

Greenland USA Facing Foreclosure at Pacific Park
Pacific Park in BK with Greenland USA's CEO Hu Gang and USIF’s Nick Mastroianni II (550 Vanderbilt, Arepa Inc., Nicholas Mastroianni)

A decade after breaking ground, mired in delays and facing a 2025 deadline to complete its affordable housing, Brooklyn’s controversial Pacific Park is slipping away from its developer.

Greenland is set to lose control of the delayed second phase of the 22-acre development formerly known as Atlantic Yards.

The company has defaulted on nearly $350 million worth of loans tied to the six rental development sites of Pacific Park’s Phase 2, The Real Deal has learned. The lender has moved to foreclose on the sites.

Greenland USA, a subsidiary of China’s state-owned Greenland Group, has been in default for roughly a year on two loans totaling $349 million. The loans cover the six incomplete sites at Pacific Park (out of 15 project sites in all) that are slated for more than 3,200 units — if they are ever built.

Greenland borrowed the money in 2014 from Nick Mastroianni’s U.S. Immigration Fund, which had raised capital through the cash-for-visas EB-5 program. The developer defaulted on the loans when they matured last November and in January, according to an offering memo from Newmark, where a team led by Jordan Roeschlaub and Adam Spies is marketing a UCC foreclosure.

The auction is scheduled for Jan. 11. It’s not clear why USIF waited a year to foreclose, although Mastroianni told TRD in May that he was working to restructure the debt so Greenland could finish the project. The lender did not respond to a request for comment. A representative for Greenland, headed by CEO Hu Gang, also did not respond.

Fortress Investment Group purchased a stake in the debt in 2020 and still owns it.

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A foreclosure would be pivotal for the megadevelopment, which drew intense local opposition from the outset and then was slowed by the Financial Crisis. It has been clear for some time that Greenland will fall short on its commitment to complete the affordable housing part of the project by 2025.

Greenland in 2014 bought a 70 percent stake in what was then Atlantic Yards from Forest City Ratner, which had proposed the project in 2003. Forest City had already completed the Barclays Center and Pacific Park’s first residential tower. The new partnership covered the project’s 13 other residential sites, plus a planned office project.

But Forest City was brought down by internal struggles, and in 2018 it sold the majority of the rest of the project to Greenland.

Greenland then started bringing in partners to develop the remaining parcels. TF Cornerstone bought two of the sites in 2019 for $143 million. The Brodsky Organization also acquired two sites. Those projects are not part of the USIF loan.

Greenland has faced trouble elsewhere. 

Last year the company was forced to take a $200 million loss when it sold its 59-story Thea at Metropolis apartment building in Downtown Los Angeles.

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Companies and People
Fortress Investment GroupGreenland USAUSIFNick Mastroianni II
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